Day 243 - Magic Beans

 Magic Beans

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

We all know magic beans don’t exist. Jack was a fool. There are no beanstalks. There are no giants living in the clouds in magic castles. Fairy-tale stuff. But... what if they weren’t all fake?

No, that does not mean there are floating castles. No, that does not mean giants exist. But magic beans? Magic beans might be another story.

 

I ate a magic bean and turned into a beanstalk

(a short thirty second play)

 

Man 1:

That wasn’t soup!

 

Man 2: 

But there were beans in it.

 

Man 1: 

You weren’t supposed to eat those! Those weren’t beans, those were magic beans...

 

Man 2: 

Magic beans? Those are real? Oh no! What’s happening to me??? I’m becoming a beanstalk…

 

Man 2 falls to the ground, grasping his stomach in pain.

 

End.

Day 242 - Magick Underwear

 Magick Underwear

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

The ad read “Magick Underwear.” And I was expecting some sort of erotic fetish cosplay sort of lingerie. Instead, it came with the promise of individualized spells and a money back guarantee.  I emailed the seller to find out if I got to pick my spells. I did not. I asked how they were individualized and what sort of information I would have to turn over to ensure they were personalized for me and me alone. The seller didn’t want to reveal trade secrets, but said that I didn’t need to turn over any personal information. Part of the spell was woven into the fabric, so when it first touched skin, it would bind itself to the wearer and the individualization would occur then.

I wondered if I had to wear them or if touching was enough. And what if I bought them but someone else touched them first? Would the spell know who the true owner was supposed to be? I was under the assumption that the whole thing was fake to begin with, so I wasn’t too concerned with all those sorts of details.

I had been under the assumption that magic with a “k” usually indicated some sort of sex cult type thing, but maybe I had just seen too many movies. I was assured this was more like the Aleister Crowley magic with a “k” and was focused on will power and willing change into existence. I still thought that having magic being cast from my nether region was somewhat sexual. I wondered if the only things to be willed into existence would be either a very good time or a very lonely time.

They had plenty of underwear specifically designed for erotic enjoyment. I politely declined. I wanted to change my life, change the world, or something with equal grandeur. If I was paying for a spell, I wanted it to count.

I bought twenty pairs. Why not? Twenty chances to change my life. Almost a month. Enough. Close enough. Day one and a new me and all that.

While they promised a money back guarantee, they wanted to be very clear that I wasn’t going to get to become king or have super powers or anything like that. These would be twenty spells of improvement and wonder, but they wanted to make sure I wasn’t setting my hopes to high.

I said I wouldn’t blame them if nothing happened. I wouldn’t sue or anything like that. But still, I was starting to get into the idea of something fantastical happening. Maybe not all twenty times, but at least once or twice.

And so, I stand naked, looking the mirror. Wondering which pair I should put on first. Will it begin with first touch? Will the first be the best or will it be a letdown? And perhaps I don’t want to find out. Perhaps the anticipation is enough. And so, I wait. And so, the anticipation grows.

Day 241 - Garden Party Do-Lang Do-Lang

 Garden Party Do-Lang Do-Lang

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

Jay stood on the porch and was going to sing. There was no band, no karaoke machine, but Jay was going to sing. He always sang. Whether the event called for it or not. It wasn’t that Jay didn’t have talent. It wasn’t like didn’t enjoy it. It was just that he did it every single time. It was like being in high school all over again when there was always some guy at the party who had learned to play all of three songs on guitar, but you knew you were going to hear all three that weekend and then again at some party the next weekend. Mitch liked Jay. He was impressed by Jay. He just didn’t need to hear him sing at every back yard cook out.

The sun was starting to set and it was still over 90 degrees. The summer had been a bitch and a bear and it wasn’t letting up. Everyone was wearing shorts. Even the too cool for school types that tried to grin a bare it while wearing pants for as long as they could. Mitch wasn’t uptight or against a little skin, but he noticed things like that.

Sally was wearing a blue sun dress with a pattern Mitch couldn’t quite figure out. Shades of blue. Various shapes. Maybe they were supposed to be like a variety of flower petals. But there was no clear flower and no clear shape. Maybe it was so people could play the cloud shape game and try to see whatever image they wanted to see in the pattern.

“Let me guess, fifty shades of blue.”

“Let me guess, any minute now Jay will serenade us.”

“Let me guess, it’s as hot as a witch’s tit.”

“Let me guess, you’ve already forgotten how many drinks you’ve had.”

“Ouch. You win.”

“As always. And how do you know how hot a witch tit is? You say some dumb things.”

“I dated a Wiccan once. Crystals and all that by the bedside at night.”

“And her tits were hot? Seriously dumb.”

“I will take that as a compliment. And I have no complaints about the memory of that poor girl and her under theres. She was a fine lass.”

“Have I ever seen you in shorts?”

“Have I seen you in a dress?”

“Ten years ago, when Dave got married.”

“Ah yes. True. You clean up nice.”

“Once every ten years.”

“Why do it more than that. You might spoil people.”

Near the front of the crowd Jay was telling jokes. Mitch could tell by the way his hands spun in front of him, emphasizing every word. He had been gesturing conversations like that since they were fifteen. His arms were thicker now, his fingers pudgier, and there was a lot more grey on top, but if Mitch squinted slightly, he could believe he was watching Jay from any other moment in the entire history of their friendship.

“He’s gearing up.”

“Oh,” said Sally as she turned. “Looks like he has company.”

It was true. Mike and Roy and Romeo had joined Jay and it was instantly obvious that they had planned this all out – matching 50’s style bowling shirts, matching khaki shorts. They looked like hosts at a bad luau. Apparently, they were going to be a bad barbershop quartet of some kind.

“Maybe they’ll have dance moves.”

“We can only hope,” replied Sally.

When the music began Sally cheered as did most of the crowd. Mitch looked down at his quickly emptying drink and wondered if it was too soon to go get another.

“The kid’s got moxie. I think he’s gonna be a star,” joked Sally.

“Hey, you remember in high school when people used to say that? Somebody was going to make it. Like the teachers and parents and other kids all thought somebody was really talented or had the right personality or whatever. Like someone at sixteen it was already preordained? Whatever happened to those kids? You know? Like did any of them make it? Did any of their dreams come true? I don’t remember hearing about a single kid from our class that made it.”

“You’re in a shitty mood tonight.”

“Maybe. I mean, but Jesus Christ, how many times to I have to hear Jay sing the same five songs? Like I get it, we all grew up together. We all had the same taste in music.”

“You’re no fun like this.”

“Learn some new music.”

“You’re one to talk. Like you ever did anything special. Or new. You learn some new music. You learn something new.”

Sally walked off. Mitch looked at his empty red cup – down to a few last little drops and a whole lot of ice. She had been right though; he wasn’t sure what number he was on.

Mitch stood in silence and watched Jay sing. Once upon a time a long time ago they had been in choir together. They were dumb kids and one of them was going to learn guitar and one of them was going to learn bass and then things would really happen. Which of course meant that at least one of them would have needed to learn to play.

Did he have any dreams left, he wondered. Had time and alcohol drank them all away? At least he didn’t make an ass of himself getting in front of everybody every chance he got.

They were singing 1950s doo-wop. And they all had smiles on their faces.

Mitch didn’t notice, but he was silently mouthing the words as they sang.

Day 240 - Paranoia on an afternoon walk

 Paranoia on an afternoon walk

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

If I lived a previous life, would I know it? Not like someone having a séance and speaking to the past or undergoing some deep hypnosis to try and unlock some clue. I mean, if the whole reincarnation, ladder of life, karma sort of stuff was real, would the person living it have any sense of it? Or if you thought too long, could you convince yourself you felt something, but really, you’re just playing mind games with yourself. Psychosomatic thinking and false memory planting based on feel good stories we like to tell ourselves.

Why was the man in the suit following me? Not overtly. Not blatantly. But I saw him every day. Nearly every day. Almost for certain most days. Did he want something from me? Did he have a plan to get it? If he did, he was most meticulous in his approach. Certainly, he had mapped out all my standard movements and deviations by now. I had seen him over and over. He could approach at any time. Maybe I should approach him. And then what would happen?

I saw a woman notice me on the street last week. She noticed me and said nothing. But later I saw a youtube video made by a different woman talking about all the men she would notice on the street and how she would write their entire life together in her head, but would never approach the person. I wondered if the woman I noticed did the same thing. Maybe she was afraid to approach me because her fantasy was better than anything that real life could afford. Or maybe she was just unimpressed.

I always wonder just a bit when I find notes written in my handwriting that I don’t remember writing. Was it really me? Did I do it and forget it? Was someone else writing me notes? Did I pick up a glitch from an alternate reality and am really reading writing from some other version of me? I think about writing really random things that make no sense and have no connection to anything in my life. If future me finds them in three or six years, what will he think? Will he remember that it was all a lie? Will he think he had a brain disease and was forgetting vast chunks of his life?

Everything seems to be a loop. Politicians, entertainers, sports figures. They just spin around in a circle forever and ever. There’s always a new model. Always a new version which is really just a spin on an old version. The same quotes get trotted out. The same game winning shots. It really takes the heart and emotion out of it if you know it’s all been done before and will all be done again.

I wonder if my parents are proud of me. What an asinine question. Of course, they are. They were designed that way. I’m proud of my son and he’s never done anything. Seriously, like nothing. All he had to do is exist and I’m proud. I’m sure they felt the same about me.

If reincarnation does work, and we do keep any ounce of our memories, would that make any sense at all to the next version, or would it be some maddening construct where you knew something insane and out of place also felt real and true. Maybe that’s where dreams come from. Maybe there’s a way to map out the world that was by remembering when no other thoughts can get in the way. Now I sound like the people that believe in hypnosis. As if a dream is anything different than a wish.

Am I someone else’s man in the suit? Like not intentionally, but all the same odds and coincidences. I walk the same streets. See the same people. I’m not following any of them. I’m not stalker, or serial killer or international spy. But they might see me that way. They might notice me and think I’m following them. They might think I’m the bad guy. Maybe that’s why that woman who noticed me stayed so far away.

Day 239 - Hammer of Pain

 Hammer of Pain

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

The hatchet was borderline psychic. Sort of. If you held it, you were definitely linked to something. Maybe it was the to the hatchet, or maybe to your opponent or maybe the hatchet itself was seeing a glimpse of the future and relaying the information? Nef didn’t know. He never felt psychic growing up, but when he first touched the hatchet, he thought he saw a momentary flash of the world through the eyes of his father. His father smiled at him and gave him a knowing wink.

Since then, he had learned to deal with a sort of double vision. He could filter things pretty well to understand what was actually happening and what was about to. The hatchet delivering the information made the most sense to him since he didn’t seem to have any sway in what he learned or how or when or why. Maybe there was a filter system. A need to know for his own benefit. Sometimes he would see was about to happen or what someone else was thinking or what someone else was seeing. Sometimes he could use the hatchet as a tool and he saw nothing. It was just a tool, chopping and cutting away. He supposed advanced knowledge then wouldn’t do much good. That is unless he was about to chop his own fingers off or something. So far, no visions of that.

None of that really made it any easier to fight his brother. He somewhat got a sense of things to come, with just a split second to know he should shift or dodge or parry. His brother was fast, faster than him. The split second was barely enough. The force of the hammer swinging through the air was enough to knock him back. If his brother pressed the attack, levied multiple swings in a row, he wasn’t sure he would be able to dodge, split second warning or not. He just wasn’t fast enough to keep this up.

Nef had hoped that he could inflict enough damage to slow Torben down, but so far, he had no luck.

Nef missed a step and the hammer collided with his left arm. Nef screamed in as he was thrown through the air. This was definitely one of the hammers that inflicted pain, he thought.

Somehow the hatchet was still in his right hand. He could sense his brother’s approach. The shadow was cast. Nef didn’t have time to stand or dodge or roll away. He twisted his body and tried to raise the hatchet upwards fast enough to catch whatever was heading down towards him. He prayed it would be enough.

Day 238 - Responsible

 Responsible

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

Nef was in his backyard gardening. If gardening meant taking a hatchet to weeds. He didn’t know if this method would be effective at all, but there was certainly a great deal of emotional release that went along with it.

Nef was surprised when Cynthia turned the corner around the garage and approached. It had been years since they had spoken. She had been off living on her father’s money and he had been very vocal about how disappointed he was in her doing so. He had totally been unfair, but then again, she made no offer of a seat on the road with, so he was particularly bitter upon realizing how low he ranked on her list of things to do.

She was already angry. Nef didn’t think he had done anything recently that she would know of, but one could never tell.

“You brother has gone missing.”

Nef breathed a small sigh of relief that this wasn’t about him.

“Half-brother.”

She rolled her eyes, which he could not see because he was not looking, but he knew she had done it all the same.

“He’s gone. And he took the hammer.”

“Which hammer?”

“Which… Wha…? You mean there’s more than one?”

“Of course, there’s more than one. You think that all hammers can do the same job? They design tools for specific purposes, you know.”

“Says the man using a hatchet to try and chop weeds.”

“I didn’t say that some things didn’t have more than one purpose.”

Nef stood up, dusted his knees off and picked up his hatchet.

“Well, I better get to it.”

“Are you sure that’s going to work?”

“Am I sure that this hatchet, which I use for gardening, is going to work in capturing or killing my half-brother? Is that really what you want to do? Come here for my help and then question literally everything I say or do?”

“I just wanted to know if you had an actual plan.”

“I don’t know. But I will have a sharp edge and can inflict all sorts of damage and he will have to land successful and powerful blows for his hammer to kill me. Hopefully I can cut him enough times that he’s too weak to pick it up and swing it properly.”

“I would suck to get smashed in the face with a hammer.”

“You might miss this pretty face.”

“I might. Try not to get it smashed.”

As if it were that easy, thought Nef. His half-brother was ten times the fighter he was. Nef could only hope that in the process of going mad he had lost a step or two when it came to precision and strategy.

“I will certainly try.”

Day 237 - Hammer

 Hammer

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

Lightning shot through his veins and his joints felt like the wanted to burst. He wanted to scream in pain as muscles convulsed. The pain was sudden, unbearable and unprovoked. Neurological, psychological or physiological, he did not know. The moment was unexpected and instant. He opened mouth to scream and his eyes felt moist. He thought of his father and the pain he had see that man bare. He did not cry, even when he only had the one good eye.

With gripped fists, he tightened his arm muscles. He dropped to his knees and drove his fists down into the damp soil. He pressed down as hard as he could and fought against the anguish. His back ached, his forearms felt like they might snap, but he pushed harder. Fingers sore, knuckles dug deeper and deeper, the soil relented.

His body felt old and weak and broken. There was no justice. Nothing was fair. Grief was never ending. He had lost a part of him, gone beyond repair. Where does it go, he asked himself. What do I become?

He was no one now. He had lost everything that was ever important.

He pushed against the earth harder.

There was no answer from above or below. No one to stop him. No one to care.

He burst up from the ground, shooting forth with the lightning force that had tortured his body. He erupted with energy and shot straight up into the sky and was gone.

The ground was broken and cracked and burnt where the energy seared the earth. The earth was scarred, the dirt turned and scattered, something powerful pulled forth from below.

Day 236 - Nail Story

 Nail Story

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

What do you do with a piece of information that doesn’t fit in and in order for it to make sense, then you have to reevaluate something where the outcomes might totally shift your life in undesirable ways? It would be easy to forget. Look away. Walk away. Think of other things for a few minutes, let the memory fade and make sure short term doesn’t meld into long term thinking.

I have successfully ignored and forgotten when friends have failed to put in their fair share on a restaurant bill. I have successfully ignored and forgotten when my girlfriend came home late one too many times after hanging out with co-workers after work.

It is easy to think of ignoring as some sort of moral compromise. Forgetting as some sort of violation of truth. Memory is mush. It’s grey. It’s made up. You combine half events with a vague idea of a song or color or smell and then suddenly you think it’s some cornerstone event. I can know that I argued with someone, but not know when it happened, what it was about, if we ever settled things or if it all happened again. Did I pick and choose or let memory fade and take its natural course? Am I tricking myself or is reality a lot more malleable that we want to believe? Who is really hurt if you sort of know something about someone but don’t really know the precise? I can keep a friend for thirty years.  There’s going to be a lot of shit that happens in thirty years. I think you have to be able to forget a thing or two. Just because it’s a blur doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, or that you have to care. You choose your level of involvement. I sound like Project Mayhem all of the sudden. I realize not everyone will know what that means. But in my grey mush of a memory, it’s a thing and it’s relevant. Or pertinent. Or one of those words that makes it seem like I know what I’m talking about.

I hurt my foot stepping on a nail. Maybe a toe nail. It was small and long and definitely not one of mine. I’m not sure if people can grow toe nails that long or if it was some sort of press on situation. The thing is, I live alone. For long enough that any random press on nail should have been swept up or vacuumed by now. So, what does that mean? Was someone in my house? Barefoot? And why would they leave a toe nail for me to find?

I see nothing missing. I’ve noticed nothing disturbed or gone. But how good is memory? Memory is mush. Memory is grey. It’s all just a poor approximation of some filtered data that stuck around long enough it sort of made an impression or two. But a mystery? A mystery lingers. A mystery digs down and turns things over and leaves you wondering, constantly itching, trying to find a resolution that is impossible to be found.

If I left a door unlocked, would I notice? Would I remember or think it strange to find a window cracked open? I tell myself to watch as the garage door comes down, just to try and make myself remember, and yet less than half a block away, I will still wonder if it was closed when I pulled away.

I found a note, written in a woman’s handwriting, listing famous paintings for me to look at. I don’t remember where the note came from or who’s writing it was. I kept the note, stashed away in a box of hand written notes to myself of things to do or read or research. Did I keep this note because I was working on something, or was I infatuated with the woman?  So much so, that I can’t remember her or why I kept it.

I put the note back in the box, so I could find it again in another five or ten years. Who needs a memory with such a captivating mystery?

Day 235 - Try not to think about it

 Try not to think about it

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

Arnold had noticed that when he entered the house his eyes were having more trouble more often adjusting to the light differential. There was a strange pulse that would occur if he had been out in direct sunlight. His brother had light migraines and tried to explain what that was like. Arnold didn’t think this was that. Perhaps as his eyes worsened with age it was just getting harder for them to adjust quickly and the pulse was some sort of re-calibration. He hadn’t told anyone yet. He needed new glasses, but hated his last prescription and wasn’t looking forward to screwing the next round up. If the machines could do so much, why couldn’t they just tell what sort of lens he needed? The whole process seemed so archaic. Lens one vs lens two. Or maybe lens three was better. Could he go back and see two again? Somehow always chose the wrong one even when he was sure he was doing it right. Arnold wondered when he could get a pair for free from his insurance. It was probably at least another year.

Oh, what was wrong today? What wasn’t? There was a pinprick pain in his right palm and his middle knuckle was sore. His left elbow had felt agitated so his whole arm was weak. What was he doing to himself? That pulse was getting stronger and he was going to have to take something soon.

Arnold looked around his bedroom. There were pills and medicine everywhere. Aspirin on the night stand in case he suddenly had a stroke or heart attack. Cough drops scattered in the top desk drawer. Sudafed for when the weather changed too rapidly or storms rolled in. Antacid on the night stand, antacid on the desk, antacid in his pocket. Maybe something was wrong. That seemed like a lot of antacid. It seemed like anything he ate at night, which now meant after six pm, would suddenly give him heart burn or acid reflux or something. His forties had been miserable.

He hoped he could sleep through the night. He took his melatonin, which didn’t always work. He took an extra swig of NyQuil on the advice of a friend. He couldn’t remember the last time he slept a solid six hours without some sort of interruption, usually to go to the bathroom. Maybe tonight was the night.

It hurt to climb into bed. Some tendon in his knee objected to him lying on his right side. He would try the left, but usually he just rolled back onto his back. That was no good for the sleep apnea. He’d probably sweat through the sheets and pillow cases as he had done for the past week. His fingers went numb when on his side like this. That might mean something. Everything meant something. How could he have high blood pressure and poor circulation? It made no sense.

Try not to think about it and go to bed. That was what he told himself. The morning dawn would come to soon and he was far too old to be able to sleep through that anymore.

Day 234 - Television Memories

 Television Memories

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

“That was a pretty good show,” was the sort of thing my father would say at the end of a first episode, which was his way of saying we would keep watching it.

“Yeah, it was okay,” was my way of saying it was barely passable as entertainment, but yes, I would continue to watch it with him, so we would have something we could share.

My father and I didn’t share many interests and that included taste in entertainment or television shows to watch. He liked weekly shows with simple plots where good guys solved problems within one hour and societal norms were reinforced. I preferred so called “prestige” television with morally gray characters with disturbing revelations and plots that ran for multiple seasons. Maybe if it were some sort of anthology with a single season long plot, we could both get on board for it.

I can only remember two shows I stopped watching where he continued. Both were situations where I felt the shows had run out of ideas and they ran for far too many seasons afterwards. He would still give me the recap the next day, as if I were still interested, or needed to know. That was one of his funny quirks in the way he shared. He really liked retelling the plots of the shows he had watched. Didn’t matter if they were good or not. Didn’t matter that he wasn’t much of a story teller. He really wanted to recount the events. Like all of us, we have some need to interact and this was one of his. If my mom had been around, they probably would have watched it together. Or in the later years when she couldn’t keep stories straight, he could tell her over and over what had happened. Maybe I was his surrogate now. Maybe I shouldn’t have been so dismissive.

I didn’t watch any of our shows for a few years. Not the ones he liked, not the ones I liked. I didn’t want the memories ruined, and I didn’t think I could handle thinking about him the entire time. “What did that mean?” “Why did this happen?” Any time he couldn’t understand what was going on I had to recap and explain. A small suffering. A minute price to pay. I would gladly suffer through again if only I was able.

I should have listened to his recaps. Maybe I should have kept watching the shows with him. An hour in such a small thing to give away, but it felt like such a waste at the time. I would love to watch something new and get to answer questions and talk about ideas and where the plots might go. I would love to share that with someone again. I should have been more kind when I had the chance. You never know.

Day 233 - I can't see

 I can’t see

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

She had been sick for ten days. Or more. No idea what it was. No idea how she got it. I should have asked about her daughter, but I forgot. My mind was dull. My muscles aching noodles. I could barely think of the words, let alone type them. Never a fast texter, all I could see were gibberish and typos. She wrote me. She cared about me. Despite her own illness. I should recognize that and say something. But I’m so tired. It counts. It has to count. I’m just too dumb to see it sometime.

Day 232 - No one ever said I was a good prepper

No one ever said I was a good prepper

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

The sandbags remained open because it was too hard to tie them off at the end. Maybe I put too much sand in. I don’t know. I ate all the snacks first because obviously they were the snacks. I stood on the porch watching the rain flood the lawn. I figured I was safe on the porch. My first injury came from not watching where I was going and turning into the corner of a stack of plywood. My fault. Totally. It was strange to be cold and hot at the same time. The sweater was an attempt to ease the tension in my arthritic arms. But sweating with AC running was odd. I’d probably catch a cold sooner or later. I should have gotten a hand crank light of some sort. And maybe some MREs or something. But I did have a box of peanut butter. So there is that.

The lights flickered. Not a good sign of things to come. Maybe I shouldn’t stand so close to the glass window in the living room.